


Cosmology

by rsadelle



Category: Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-02-07
Updated: 2002-02-07
Packaged: 2017-10-27 04:27:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/291624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rsadelle/pseuds/rsadelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Viggo's musings on the Fellowship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cosmology

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Melle for her encouragement.

We all became our characters in a way. Ian was the wise old man with incredible strength. The Hobbits were children and always together. John was the Dwarf, ugly and far from his people. Sean and I were the hardened warriors, old and tired. Elijah was the center we all revolved around. We were in love with him, and we wanted to protect him. Only Orli was immune to it. He had the body of an Elf, but not the soul. He was a child, too, and so he lived his life with the Hobbits.

They broke all our hearts.

It was easiest for Ian. He had more experience than the rest of us, and he knew it would never last. He knew what they were like.

It was easy, too, for the Hobbits. They were friends. It was easier to start and easier to finish. They got Elijah and Orli all the time, and so it didn't matter as much to them when the degree changed and changed back again.

Even Sean was able to look at it philosophically. Elijah replaced Orli in his bed, and when Liv replaced him in Orli's, he just shrugged and drank a few more pints than normal.

John took it hard. He was so amazed and joyed that anyone would love him. That it was the two of them only made it more of a marvel. He was hurt when they moved on. We could all see it, but he didn't want any help. He drank alone for a while, but then he slowly drifted back to us. No one could resist the pull of Elijah and Orli, our dual suns.

It was hardest for me. The poet's soul, Orli would say. The painter's soul, Elijah would say. The delusional old man, I would say.

My heart broke when Orli left my bed the first time. It broke a little more when Elijah left. I thought I would never recover when Orli left me the second time.

I did, of course. No one could stay heartbroken with the children around. They kept us all laughing and happy.

Orli's hair was different yet again last year. He'd had the Elvish nine shaved into his head. He bent down for us and for the cameras to show it off, and we all had to touch.

I showed up then, and touching him nearly tore me apart. He looked up and let out a whoop.

"Viggo!" He was on me then, wrapping himself around me and kissing my cheek with those impossibly warm lips.

I laughed. How could I not? "Oh, Orli," I sighed against his cheek. I traced the pattern on his head. "It's beautiful." Just like you, but I left that unsaid. He grinned at me and we continued up the carpet to the theater.

For all of that fuss, it was Elijah who came to my bed that night. I saw Orli with the other children. I assume he bedded one of them.

This year was harder. Ian died two weeks before the first of our last premieres. Sean and I were the only ones who made it to the funeral. I saw flowers from the children, all five of them, and from Peter and John.

Afterwards, Sean and I went to a pub, loosened our ties, and got roaring drunk. We stumbled back to the hotel and went to our separate rooms. I cried, harder even than I had when Orli left me the second time. I don't know about Sean.

We went back to New Zealand a few days later. Everything had changed, but we wandered around anyway, until the others started to arrive. Elijah came to see me one evening. He pulled me down and kissed my forehead gently.

I didn't see Orli until the premiere.

We were all a little subdued. Orli didn't jump on me this year. He came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me. I still remembered the feel of his body, and I knew it was him even before he whispered into my ear. I couldn't stop myself from covering his hands with mine and leaning back against him. He kissed just behind my ear and let me go, but he didn't go far.

At the party afterwards, we, only eight now, drew away from the crowd and found our own table in the corner. Peter came by to say hi to us, and Bob, but we were left mostly alone.

We drank, and we talked, and we remembered. Only eight now. Orli's hair was smooth, but his sleeves were short, and I watched his nine move with the tensing and releasing of his muscles.

When the party started breaking up, we stayed. When the waiters started cleaning up, we stayed. It was only when even they, as well trained as they were, started glaring at us that Orli took us in hand. Took me in hand. He took my wrist and said it was time for bed. Sean raised his pint to me as we left.

I cried when he took me. He kissed my tears away. Orli could make even such an absurdly romantic gesture seem perfectly reasonable. He told me again and again that he loved me. I couldn't believe him even though I knew it was true. I knew it was the last time.

The last premiere was in LA. Appropriate, somehow, that our ending would be there. I watched the children play and felt old.

We didn't separate ourselves so much at this party, but we left together, loath to end our solidarity. I watched Orli follow Elijah to his room. They couldn't see anything but each other. I should have hated them, but I couldn't. I loved them, even then.

I turned away to find Sean at my elbow. "Join me for a drink, mate?"

My relief was almost its own presence between us. I went with him to his room and let him ply me with whiskey and silence.

I was both surprised and not when he kissed me. It made sense, I suppose. The two old men together. But it was more than that. It was all the times we'd sat together in silence and been at peace. It was all the times we'd gotten fully drunk together. It was all the times we'd practiced our swordplay together. It was everything we were to each other, and everything Orli and Elijah had been to us. We'd known that, the heartbreak and the joy, and it made us ready for each other.

This is the end of it, here, now. Sean drifting in and out of sleep in what I'm already starting to think of as our bed, and me, sitting here writing.

I say it's the end, but it's not, not really. I know what will happen. We promised to all keep in touch, but already we've broken that, and it will only become worse as time goes on.

We'll run into each other every once in a while, maybe two of us will do another movie together. It won't be the same.

Someday someone will organize a reunion, either for the press or just for us. That won't be the same either. It'll be strained until we get used to each other again, and then it'll be almost but not quite the way it was before. And if Orli comes to my bed, or Elijah, I won't turn him away, but Sean will be there.


End file.
